Pharmaceuticals are often made available in tablets or capsules. One form of packaging commonly used is a so-called blister pack. In such a blister pack, there are a plurality of blisters, usually made by thermoforming a polymeric film. In each blister there may be one or more tablets. The tablets are retained in the blister by means of a foil which is adhered to the blistered film. Sometimes, the blister pack also has a printed card adhered to the blister film. In use, a person will release a tablet from a blister by gripping the blister pack and pushing upon the blister with a thumb until the tablet is forced through the foil backing.
In some jurisdictions, when a blister pack is not fully utilized, i.e. not all of the tablets are used, the tablets must be removed from the blister pack and destroyed. In other jurisdictions, the tablets may be removed from the blister pack and recovered. In any event, the tablets need removing from the blister pack.
It is common in hospitals and nursing homes for there to be a substantial number of blister packs which need to be emptied of tablets. This occurs, for example, when a patient dies and the tabletted medication is no longer needed. In such instances, one of the staff at the hospital or nursing home must "pop" the tablets out of the blister packs. The process is labour intensive and causes pain to the thumb of the person who is "deblistering" the tablets. Indeed, in cases where relatively large volumes of tablets need to be deblistered, there may be injury to the thumb and hand.
A number of attempts have been made to make machinery which performs the task of deblistering. One such machine attempts to emulate the manual removal of tablets by providing a support for the back of the blister pack and replacing the thumb with a rod or pin. In order to make such a machine practically useful, a plurality of pins are used. Such machine uses a perforated first plate in which the perforations correspond to the positioning of the blisters on a particular blister pack. A plurality of pins which protrude from a second plate are located to pass through corresponding perforations in the first plate. The blister pack is placed on the perforated plate and the pins are brought into contact with the blisters in an attempt to punch the tablets through the perforations. It has been found, however, that such machines intended to deblister more than about 10 blisters require unreasonable force to be applied to the plate with the pins, even when the pins have sharp ends to reduce the surface area of contact with the blisters.
Another machine, sold under the trade mark PRESS-OUT uses two motor-driven counter-rotating rollers. The rollers, which in longitudinal cross-section appear castellated, mesh with one another. The distances between the peaks and valleys of the castellation are determined by the distances between columns of blisters and the diameter of each blister. Such a machine requires a large number of sets of machined rollers to accommodate the different styles of blister packs. In addition, such machine is very expensive to make and purchase. Its expense makes it available only to the largest nursing homes and hospitals.
There is a need for a simple inexpensive machine, which can be operated by one person, without having to exert a lot of strength. There is also a need for a machine which is portable and, for example, can be taken from nursing home to nursing home. The present invention addresses these needs.
The terms "solid dosage form" as used herein includes tablets or capsules of pharmaceuticals.